Mike Rankin is the UW-Extension Crops and Soils agent for Fond du Lac County. Contact him at 929-3170 or email him at michael.rankin@ces.uwex.edu.

I arrived in Fond du Lac in 1988. Like the current version, it was a year of dusty umbrellas.

By the time I got here in mid-August, most of the crop damage from parched soils had been done. That first fall on the job was spent getting firsthand experience with high nitrate forage, aflatoxin in corn, and calculating reasonable rental rates for corn cribs. I somehow missed taking the college course that explained the latter.

Fast forward to June 1991 - there I was standing on the side of a town road with a television crew from Green Bay. The corn field in the background was totally submerged in water. As the interviewer asked the usual hard-hitting questions such as "Will this hurt the corn?" a fish jumped out of the water. Timing is everything in show business.

Since then, there have been other extreme years. I personally will never forget the brutal heat of July 1995, the 100-year rain event of May 2004 followed by another 100-year rain event four years later, and the record cool summer of 2009.

Enter 2012, with little to no snow in January and February and a March that was warmer than April. Torrential rain fell in early May followed by ... well ... nothing but heavy dew for week after week through late July. August provided just enough rain, and then the spigot dried-up again in September.

The current year did provide some learning opportunities. The variegated cutworm reached rock star status in most agricultural circles by the time early June rolled around. This insect was previously nothing more than a footnote, but adult moths flocked to our state this spring like Illinoisans on Memorial Day weekend. Alfalfa and soybean fields decimated. Most of the damage was attributed to the cutworms, not the folks from Illinois.

Black cutworms, potato leafhoppers and two-spotted spider mites also had a strong presence in 2012. Overall, it was a banner year for even our common insect pests with development often four to five weeks ahead of normal.

We also learned in 2012 that modern plant genetics provides a far superior product than what was available in the drought of 1988. Today's corn hybrids tolerate multiple stresses much better than days of old. As bad as some fields looked in mid-July, many still yielded well above 100 bushels per acre. I still anticipate a county average corn yield near 130 bushels per acre. This compares to our 1988 average yield of 78 bushels per acre.

Other life lessons from 2012 included the fact that a reliance on glyphosate herbicide alone won't do a very good job of controlling lambsquarters in a soybean field when both the crop and weeds are under stress. OK, we already knew this, but it was confirmed in multiple fields anyway.

What we didn't know is that winter wheat apparently doesn't need moisture to yield upwards of 100 bushels per acre. We can explain some pretty decent soybean yields with a few timely late-July and August rains, but where did the early July wheat yield come from? Must have been those heavy dews in June.

This year gave us the opportunity to hand shake early developing corn ears to see if they pollinated. Further, many farmers got a second planting season in July to try their luck with a variety of emergency forages or double-crop soybeans. We also discovered that when things get tough and the fear of short commodity supplies sets in, corn can reach $8 and soybeans follow along at $17 per bushel.

Finally, we learned in 2012 that a lousy bullpen will keep a major league baseball team out of the playoffs.

So what now?

Contrary to what a certain senator from Oklahoma might think, it certainly appears to me that climate change is the real deal and those of us who call ourselves human are mostly to blame. The scientific evidence is just too overwhelming. We need to change our ways.

Climate, however, is a long-term deal; think lack of Cubs World Series championships. Weather, on the other hand, is the here and now. Making cropping plans for 2013 is best accomplished with the expectation of normal growing season weather - not dry or wet, not hot or cool, but normal. This is the same approach recommended after a wet 2008, a cool 2009, and the bin-busters of 2010 and 2011.

Guessing the weather rarely pays dividends. Rather, it makes more sense to manage and prepare for the worst with tools like crop insurance or forage inventory building. These lessons were learned a long time ago.

ADVERTISEMENT

ADVERTISEMENT

ADVERTISEMENT

Email this article

Lessons learned from 2012

I arrived in Fond du Lac in 1988. Like the current version, it was a year of dusty umbrellas. By the time I got here in mid-August, most of the crop damage from parched soils had been done.

A link to this page will be included in your message.

Join Our Team!

If you are interested in working for an innovative media company, you can learn more by visiting: